Example 5 Solution: Temple Bridge

First, I control click on two representative areas of green foliage, creating two control points on each curve.

This operation could also be done with a single contrast pin command, which would create a point at each end of the color worm..

Two things need to happen to intensify and separate the foliage colors. The curve needs to become steeper between the two points on the a curve, and we need to retain a realistic foliage color, closer to yellow than green on the hue clock.

Let's take care of the first requirement - making the curve steeper. This gives a nice intensity to the trees, but the color is much too green.

Enter the b curve. It also has two control points, corresponding to the amount of yellow in the two foliage colors that I control clicked on.

On the right, I've made steepened the curve between the two points, increasing the amount of yellow, and resulting in a more natural foliage color. I'll fine tune this later.

Now the Lightness curve - adding just a but of steepness between its two points adds significant contrast and detail to the foliage.

I'm being fairly conservative. Too extreme of an S curve woud rob detail from the shadow and hight areas, which are significant in this image.

The foliage is much perkier now, which is not surprising, but the actual colors are still too blue to be convincing.

I alt click on several different areas of foliage, and three of the four are too far from yellow for a good foliage color.

Foliage needs to be between green and yellow, preferably closer to yellow than green.

The hue clock positions on the right are the result of small adjustments of the a and b curves. The two top hue clocks are ideal foliage colors, the bottom two are less ideal, but are an acceptable compromise.

Here's the final image. The statue, building, and bridge tower are close to neutral on the hue clock, and the foliage colors are almost jumping off the page.

As a side effect of bumping the foliage, the red and gold colors of the bridge have also increased in saturation.

That's all for this example. Thanks for reading, and happy curving!